In Contention

Tag: Oscar Talk

  • OSCAR TALK: Ep. 2 — ‘Up in the Air,’ disagreeing on ‘The Road’ and Toronto looms

    Oscar TalkWelcome to the second installment of Oscar Talk with yours truly and indieWIRE‘s Anne Thompson.  We tried to set aside some time in Telluride to do one of these, but time never seemed to permit.

    Anne is in Toronto this week, and, at the time of this recording (yesterday, so all “todays” and “tomorrows” should be re-purposed accordingly), was gearing up for a screening of Jon Amiel’s “Creation.”

    We tightened things up slightly this time, clocking in at just over 25 minutes.  Here are a few of the topics we discussed:

    • Which films are going to be tested by their exposure in Toronto (John’s coverage begins this weekend)?

    • The story out of Telluride, “Up in the Air,” and the awards prospects for the film across the board.

    • The dueling Best Supporting Actress hopefuls from the film, Anna Kendrick and Vera Farmiga.

    • The cool reception Jane Campion’s “Bright Star” is receiving in some quarters and how that could work against its major Oscar potential, despite exquisite craftwork.

    • By popular demand, Anne and I disagree on something: John Hillcoat’s “The Road.”

    • The “schizophrenic” marketing of the film, moving from genre/suspense to the love/warmth at its center.

    Have a listen below.  And by the way, these should be filtering in through iTunes now, so you can subscribe to the podcast here.

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  • OSCAR TALK: Ep. 1 — Best in show so far, campaign strategies, festival preview and “the 10”

    Oscar TalkWelcome to the first installment of Oscar Talk, a (hopefully) weekly podcast between myself and Anne Thompson, newly of indieWIRE.  We spend some time getting our feet wet in this introductory kudocast, but among the topics on the rundown:

    • Films screened thus far with the best Oscar profile heading into the awards season, including “The Hurt Locker,” “Up” and even some discussion on “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.”

    • Meryl Streep’s performance in “Julie & Julia,” what Anne calls “the story of the summer,” and how Streep succeeds into her 60s where her contemporary actresses have not.

    • Oscar’s controversial move to 10 and what how we think it will affect the awards landscape.

    • The rise of indie studios such as Overture Films, Summit Entertainment and Apparition.

    • Shifting philosophies of Oscar campaign strategies

    • Paramount bumping “Shutter Island” to 2010.

    • All things “Avatar”: the new trailer, “Avatar” Day, etc.

    • A festival preview as Anne runs down her list of anticipations at Toronto.

    And then we ran out of steam.  For now.  I runs close to 40 minutes, but we had plenty to discuss in this first edition. We’ll whittle it down by half that in future installments, I’m sure.

    Have a listen below.  (Audio?  How novel!)  We’ll try to do another one from Telluride but the more consistent stuff will probably pick up in a month or so.

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